‘Journey to the Planet Earth: Extreme Realities’ premieres on PBS tonight Dec. 15, 2014

A new episode of “Journey to Planet Earth” narrated by Oscar-winner Matt Damon, premieres tonight on PBS and takes a cold, hard look at climate change, especially global warming: the “Extreme Realities” of climate change.

But it’s not just the melting of the polar ice cap and the rising of ocean levels and temperatures that concerns scientists. In “Journey to Planet Earth: Extreme Realities” the filmmakers examine the potential – and real – geo-political security threat caused by climate change.

For example, when people suffer, they turn to whoever can help them. Take the farmers in Afghanistan where drought has led famers to growing poppies for cash -from the Taliban. As heroin floods our neighborhoods and addiction kills young and old, where do we look for the cause and the remedy? The guy who stands on the corner selling it? Our jails are filled with the wrong people.

The recent drought and heat waves in Russia (2010) caused a shortage in wheat, affected prices and contributed to huge food shortages in the middle east, one of Russia’s biggest customers. Starvation does not lead to peace or global stability.

And on and on the stories go.

The film ends by offering positive action that we can take to stop the effects of climate change, beginning with finding alternatives to fossil fuels.

The Climate Change Conference just concluded in Lima, “barely salvaged” a “weak deal” looking ahead to a more significant meeting next year in Paris, reported USA Today.

Change is hard where greed is a way of life. Kudos to the filmmaking community that is not afraid to tell the truth about climate change and what we can do to stop what is already happening to the people we don’t see – yet their lives and their needs affect us, just as our lack of awareness and care for the earth we share affects theirs.

“Journey to Planet Earth: Extreme Realities, “ for all the bad news, is optimistic. It is a prophetic film for all of us to ponder this Advent season – because we won’t be able to say “we didn’t know” or “we didn’t understand” afterward.

Climate change is the new normal – and it has ramifications on every aspect of human life on the planet – now.